were it necessary to give up either the Primaries or the University, I would rather abandon the last. because it is safer to have a whole people respectably enlightened, than a few in a high state of science and the many in ignorance. this last is the most dangerous state in which a nation can be...

of all things the most important is the completion of the buildings. the remission of the debt will come of itself. it is already remitted in the mind of every man, even of the enemies of the institution. and there is nothing pressing very immediately for it’s expression. the great object of our...

our intention is that it’s professors shall be of the first order in their respective lines which can be procured on either side of the Atlantic.

I, am laying the foundation of an University in my native state, which I hope will repay the liberalities of it’s legislature by improving the virtue and science of their country, already blest with a soil and climate emulating those of your favorite Lodi. I have been myself the Architect of the...

You are right in what you have thought and done as to the Metops of our Doric pavilion. those of the baths of Diocletian are all human faces, and so are to be those of our Doric pavilion. but in my middle room at Poplar Forest, I mean to mix the faces and ox-sculls, a fancy which I can indulge in...

this institution will be based on the illimitable freedom of the human mind. for here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.

this institution of my native state, the Hobby of my old age, will be based on the illimitable freedom of the human mind, to explore and to expose every subject susceptible of it’s contemplation. our right may be doubted of mortgaging posterity for the expenses of a war in which they will have a...

if our legislature does not heartily push our University we must send our children for education to Kentucky or Cambridge. the latter will return them to us fanatics & tories, the former will keep them to add to their population if however we are to go a begging any where for our education, I...

form the statesmen, legislators & judges, on whom public prosperity, & individual happiness are so much to depend.

now what we wish is that these pavilions as they will shew themselves above the dormitories, shall be models of taste & good architecture, & of a variety of appearance, no two alike, so as to serve as specimens for the Architectural Lectures.